The invention relates to a power tool provided with a switch adapted for setting the drive motor of the tool into operation, with the switch being manually activatable by a pivotable or swingable manual activator, and with the tool being provided with a safety device a component of which must be moved out of a blocking position before the manual activator can be moved for effecting drive motor turn-on.
An electromotor-driven hand-held power tool of the type in question is already known. The tool is provided with a locking member in the form of a slider shiftable in direction transverse to the direction of activating movement of the manual activator of the tool. With the activator in the switch-off position, the slider can be shifted to a blocking position preventing movement of the activator to the switch-on position. When the slider is shifted into unblocking position, the activator can then be moved into switch-on position. After the activator has been moved into switch-on position, the slider can be moved into a position preventing the activator from moving back to switch-off position. However, if the slider is not moved into the just-mentioned position after the activator has been moved into switch-on position, then the activator will automatically return to switch-off position when the hand of the user of the tool is removed from the activator.
That hand-held power tool is indeed safeguarded against unintentional drive motor turn-on. However, the need to shift the blocking member transverse to the direction of activating movement of the activator, before being able to move the activator to the turn-on position, is undesirable in many circumstances, particularly when the power tool should be capable of being quickly turned off. In the latter case,the power tool should be provided with a switch-on safety lock not requiring an additional unlocking movement. Rather, the user of the tool should be able to unlock the safety lock utilizing the same motion of his hand involved in the movement of the activator to switch-on position.